


Petals and All

by wynnebat



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Established Relationship, Flowers, HP: EWE, M/M, Post-Canon, Professor Harry Potter, Severus Snape Lives
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-26
Updated: 2020-05-26
Packaged: 2021-03-02 17:54:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,054
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24380878
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wynnebat/pseuds/wynnebat
Summary: “I should throw these in your face,” Severus said, thoughtfully.“After all the time I spent picking them?”“I never told you I wanted flowers.”A little gently, Harry said, “I’ll bring them to you anyway.”
Relationships: Harry Potter/Severus Snape
Comments: 13
Kudos: 429





	Petals and All

**Author's Note:**

> First sentence prompted by wolfish-willow.

The mist was a welcome relief after the warm weather of the last month. Harry left the castle in the evening, hoping to finish his task before nightfall, and found himself still walking as the moon rose and darkness smothered the mist. It was a hot summer and a cool night. Harry breathed in the mist as he walked, his eyes peeled for both predators and for his target.

He made for a sorry picture. The bottoms of his robes dragged mud across the floor of the Forbidden Forest and his shoes squelched with every step. His glasses were suspiciously crooked from his last fall. It wasn’t one of Harry’s best visits to the Forbidden Forest, but it still had some ways to go before it was his worst.

It was a laborious, messy trek to find the first of the baneflowers, and Harry kept walking until he collected enough for a bouquet. They were beautiful purple flowers with black veins, shining in the dark with an eerie glow. Harry was careful not to breathe in their pollen. He wouldn’t want to drift off to sleep and wake up to an acromantula carrying him off to its den.

The trek back to the castle felt longer, whether because of the hour or the flowers’ effect. Hogwarts was quiet without students; in the summer, Harry missed the students, and during the school year he missed the silence. He stopped by his own quarters briefly to change, to clean the flowers’ stems, and to rummage around for a spare ribbon.

He would put them in a vase, but he didn’t own one. Severus wouldn’t appreciate a vase anyway. Harry hoped that he would appreciate the flowers at least. They were a useful potions ingredient, especially freshly picked. They were also beautiful, but Harry got the feeling that this wasn’t a major concern of the potion master’s.

Harry sneezed and rubbed at his eyes, hoping that this wasn’t a sign of an oncoming collapse. He didn’t need a fit of flower induced vapors.

The urge to faint passed. Harry picked up the flowers again and made his way to the dungeons. He knocked on Severus’s door. It was late, but he didn’t worry about waking Severus up. Either he would answer, ignore him, or this was one of the rare days when he went to bed early, and Harry’s knock wouldn’t wake him anyway.

After a moment, the door opened to reveal Severus Snape. Once, he had been Harry’s least favorite person; the Harry of a decade ago would never have gone out of his way to bring Severus flowers. Hell, he may have even turned down a job at the prospect of sharing a castle with him for longer than the required seven years of schooling. Severus had brought gloom to Harry’s thoughts and caution to his adventures, and Harry had never quite forgiven him for it. He didn’t need to; it turned out that all he had to do was love him, and the rest had lost all of its importance. Peacetime had a way of doing so. Harry had never known peace until Voldemort was finally gone from this world. And when he was, many of his old hurts had followed with him, paving the way for a future that gained brightness each day.

“I brought you flowers,” Harry said, holding them up for Severus’s perusal. “They’re your favorites.”

“They are not,” Severus replied. He took them anyway, examining them first with his eyes, then running a finger against the edges of one flower. “Freshly picked?”

“I just came from the forest,” Harry agreed.

Severus nodded. “I should probably thank you.”

“Are you going to?”

“Wasn’t that thanks enough?” Severus replied with a raised eyebrow. “You rouse me at one in the morning—”

“You weren’t asleep,” Harry said with surety. “I’ve never seen you sleep.”

“You interrupt me whilst I speak,” Severus went on to say.

“You don’t have anything nice to say anyway.”

“You insult me.”

At that, Harry nodded, only barely stifling a grin. “What are you going to do about it?”

“I should throw these in your face,” Severus said, thoughtfully.

“After all the time I spent picking them?”

“I never told you I wanted flowers.”

A little gently, Harry said, “I’ll bring them to you anyway.”

For a moment, he thought Severus might really throw them in his face anyway. Harry hoped he didn’t faint right away from the flowers’ pollen. He’d hit his head on the stone floors and Severus would be doubly irritated at having to lug him to the hospital wing.

“I have some use for them,” Severus finally said, his gaze on the flowers. When he looked up, his eyes were dark, and his face was not. “You’ll help me prepare them.”

“Sure,” Harry said, taking a step inside. He watched Severus close the door, then conjure a vase for the flowers and set them on the low table next to the sofa. “What do you want me to do—”

He didn’t get very far, for Severus had found a better use of his mouth. Harry grinned into the kiss and walked Severus to the edge of the sofa, intending to make use of it as he had a few times in the past.

Severus pushed him away, grasping Harry’s robe to keep him from going too far. “The bedroom.”

“Yes,” Harry said, stomach swooping in delight. “That’s—outstanding.”

“Do you grade your students with such laxity?”

“You’re such a dick.”

“I am,” Severus agreed. “And yet you follow me to my room.”

Harry looked around for the sake of argument, not because he wanted to look away from Severus. “It’s a nice room. You’ve never let me in before.”

“You’ve never spent hours collecting flowers for me. Silly gesture. You know I don’t need them.”

“Maybe I need them,” Harry said, smiling as he reached for Severus once more. “Maybe I need to give them to you, and you’ll just have to suffer through them.”

“If I must,” Severus said, and kissed him. But he didn’t do it fast enough. Harry caught the smile tugging at his lips and the humor in his gaze, and he was more than content. The flowers had done their job. And he hadn’t even had to swoon for them.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks for reading! I'm also on [Tumblr](https://wynnefic.tumblr.com/).

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [The Potions and Promises of the Half-Blood Prince](https://archiveofourown.org/works/25487944) by [elliebennett](https://archiveofourown.org/users/elliebennett/pseuds/elliebennett)




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